How,exactly, do you make money from posting a popular video on YouTube? I never understood it.
You can "monetize" your videos on YouTube. You have to set up an account on Google AdSense to receive payment into, then you're good to go.
When you monetize your videos, viewers will start to see ads embedded in them (you have options as to how the ads are inserted). It's the ads that generate the revenue (pennies per 1000 views).
It’s all about advertising. Let’s say your videos get a million views a month. The average CPM rate is around $2.00 (per 1,000 views). That would generate $2,000/mo in revenue. It sounds like small change but if you have a popular video, it adds up quick. It’s not uncommon for a hot video to get over ten million views in a matter of days.
For established content providers who have a subscriber base and can deliver the target demographic the advertiser is seeking, tthe CPM rate can be as high as $10/thousand views.